Brief by Shorts91 Newsdesk / 06:05pm on 14 Feb 2026,Saturday International
The UK and four other countries accused Russia of killing opposition leader Alexei Navalny using dart frog toxin, confirming presence of "epibatidine" a South American poison not naturally found in Russia. His widow Yulia Navalnaya declared his 2024 Arctic prison death is now a "scientifically proven" murder, based on smuggled biological samples analyzed last September. The countries reported Russia to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons for violating the Chemical Weapons Convention. UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper called it the "Kremlin's barbaric plot to silence his voice." Navalny was previously poisoned with Novichok nerve agent in 2020. Russian authorities strenuously deny involvement despite no innocent explanation for the toxin's presence.
